so what's your take on how this variant spreads faster? is it down to humans again not being as "safe" as they should or is it just that more contagious that even one speck of the virus gets into the airways and you've got it?

My doctor told me the new variant is way more contagious (not sure on details) and it's more prone to get young people. I have a friend who go it, the whole family ended up getting it but their parents who watch their three kids didn't. It's pretty crazy, everyone was down for 5 days (some worse than others) and then recovered. On your covid test they tell you the variant you get apparently.

In the end, whatever makes you most comfortable is what matters most.
As an example, I wear all my shit right? And I'm standing in an abnormally small elevator with a covid + patient. I'd be lying if I said this wasn't my thought process: "shit man... if there's even the slightest breach in my PPE, I'm fucked" and I held my breath the entire ride down

Yes most likely because we can't seem to eraticate it. People are already getting lax because they think oh, we have a vaccine now we are okay. Which is why cases are going up. Mind you at the rate we are vaccinating at and the fact that we need like 70% for immunity and some people don't want these shit vaccines. I don't see us getting out of this before summer as everyone is trying to push for. Also I read there are going to be 8 new vaccines coming out that are suppose to be better and some don't even require and injection. These have not been approved yet but yah I'll wait for the good ones. Even my parents don't want the AZ. One day it's not for ppl over 65 and the next day the rest of the world is throwing them out and we then decide it's fine for ppl over 65? Um yeah no thanks.

Here comes the wave of family members calling 911 for their elders who just received the vaccine.

Here comes the wave of family members calling 911 for their elders who just received the vaccine.

Is this a prediction or are you already seeing/experiencing it?

E.U. Will Curb Covid Vaccine Exports for 6 Weeks
The European Union presented new emergency rules that will most likely severely cut exports to Britain and other countries to ease supply shortages at home.

BRUSSELS — The European Union is advancing emergency legislation that will give it broad powers to curb exports for the next six weeks of Covid-19 vaccines manufactured in the bloc, a sharp escalation in its response to supply shortages at home that have created a political maelstrom amid a rising third wave on the continent.

The legislation unveiled Wednesday includes new rules that will make it harder for pharmaceutical companies producing Covid-19 vaccines in the European Union to export them and are likely to disrupt supply to Britain.

The European Union has been primarily at loggerheads with AstraZeneca since it drastically cut its supply to the bloc, citing production problems in January, and the company is the main target of the new rules. But the legislation, which could block the export of millions of doses from E.U. ports, could also affect the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.

Britain is by far the biggest beneficiary of E.U. exports and will stand to lose the most by these rules, but they could also be applied to curb exports to other countries like Canada, for example, the second-largest recipient of E.U.-made vaccines, as well as Israel, which gets doses from the bloc but is very advanced in its vaccination campaign and therefore seen as less needy.

“We are in the crisis of the century. And I’m not ruling out anything for now, because we have to make sure that Europeans are vaccinated as soon as possible,” Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, said in comments last week that paved the way for the new rules. “Human lives, civil liberties and also the prosperity of our economy are dependent on that, on the speed of vaccination, on moving forward.”

The legislation is unlikely to affect the United States, which has so far received fewer than one million doses from E.U.-based facilities.

The Biden administration has said it has secured enough doses from its three authorized manufacturers — Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson — to cover all adults in the country by the end of May. The overwhelming bulk of that supply is coming from plants in the United States. The country also exports vaccine components to the European Union, which is reluctant to risk any disruption to the supply chain of raw materials.

The European Union allowed pharmaceutical companies to fulfill their contracts by authorizing them to export more than 40 million vaccine doses to 33 countries between February and mid-March, with 10 million going to Britain and 4.3 million to Canada. The bloc has kept about 70 million at home and distributed them to its 27 member nations, but its efforts to mount mass vaccination campaigns have been set back by a number of missteps.

Exporting liberally overseas when supply at home is thin has been a key part of the problem, and the bloc has come under criticism for permitting exports in the first place, when the United States and Britain practically locked up domestic production for domestic use through contracts with pharmaceutical companies.

The outcome has been a troubled vaccine rollout for the world’s richest group of nations. The impact of the failures is being exacerbated by a third wave that is sending health care systems across the continent into emergency mode and ushering in painful new lockdowns.

I think I heard Canada doesn't give a fuck and are still taking them. Most likely because we don't have enough vaccines so they taking anything they can get like a third world country. They are in a rush to open back cause rich people want their summer. My guess is they will stop giving second doses all together.

I don't understand why we can't make our own stuff. This country needs to be more independent for shit like this. Last year it was the 3M masks begging US to ship and now it's vaccines. I understand there is cost involved but are there no labs in the country that could replicate the vaccine and at the very least make enough for your own people?

Like have the government temporarily take over the big ass EMPTY Eli Lilly facility off Danforth Rd and ramp it up to produce our own supply.

Retailers will be still open at lower capacity.
So this shut down wouldn't make any difference for me.
When it was a curb side only, it felt like a long drag.
But I am good with this shut down.

Ive been cutting my own hair and don't want to eat-in anyway.

Last night, I had a guy breathing once a second, with oxygen saturation level of 50%, a heart rate of 135 at rest and a fever of 38.9°C.

Guess what he likely has?

Today... 3 covid calls among all the other calls we did.
One of those was an entire family of positives. We didn’t take anyone. Cancelled them off.

While at one Hospital, another free wheeled by on their way OUT of the EMRG with a patient.
Young. Covid positive. Intubated. Sedated. And on levophed.
The reason they’re leaving the hospital with this patient is because there’s no room left in the ICU for them so they have to go to a hospital that does.

Unfortunately, SHN (centenary, grace and general) are all over capacity, sunnybrook is over capacity, Humber is full.
Over capacity means the ICU is full and there are ICU patients receiving ICU care in the EMRG.

The mobile hospital at Sunnybrook is now accepting applications to staff it ...


That’s not a good time.